Adam Kalsey

This is the blog of Adam Kalsey. Unusual depth and complexity. Rich, full body with a hint of nutty earthiness.

Content Management

Road paper

28 Sep 2001

Business travelers often accumulate piles of paper in their briefcase and are then overwhelmed by it when they arrive at home. In "Taming the Paper Tiger" Barbara Hemphill provides tips on managing the receipts, business cards, and notes that you get while on the road.

She says there are three things that can be done with any piece of paper: "toss it, act on it, or file it" and that you should decide the moment you receive a piece of paper which category it falls in. "Ask yourself, 'What�s the worst possible thing that would happen if I didn�t have this piece of paper?' If you can live with the results, toss it. When you are tempted to postpone a decision about a specific piece of paper, ask yourself: 'What am I going to know tomorrow that I don�t know today?'"

Recently Written

Your OKR Cascade is Breaking Your Strategy
Aug 1: Most companies cascade OKRs down their org chart thinking it creates alignment. Instead, it fragments strategy and marginalizes supporting teams. Here's what works better than the waterfall approach.
Your Prioritization Problem Is a Strategy Problem
Jul 23: Most teams struggle with prioritization because they're trying to optimize for everything at once. The real problem isn't having too many options—it's not having a clear strategy to choose between them. Without strategy, every decision feels equally important. With strategy, most decisions become obvious.
Behind schedule
Jul 21: Your team is 6 weeks late and still missing features. The solution isn't working harder—it's accepting that your deadlines were fake all along. Ship what you have. Cut ruthlessly. Stop letting "one more day" turn into one more month.
VC’s Future Lies In Building Winners
Jun 21: AI and megafunds are about to kill the traditional venture model, forcing smaller VCs to stop hunting for hidden gems and start rolling up their sleeves to fix broken companies instead.
Should individual people have OKRs?
May 14: A good OKR describes and measures an outcome, but it can be challenging to create an outcome-focused OKR for an individual.
10 OKR traps and how to avoid them
May 8: I’ve helped lots of teams implement OKRs or fix a broken OKR process. Here are the 10 most common problems I see, and what to do instead.
AI is Smart, But Wisdom Requires Judgement
May 3: AI can process data at lightning speed, but wisdom comes from human judgment—picking the best imperfect option when facts alone don’t point the way.
Decoding Product Leadership Titles
Mar 18: Not all product leadership titles mean what they sound like. ‘Head of Product’ can mean anything from a senior PM to a true VP. Here’s how to tell the difference.

Older...

What I'm Reading